What was Ovechkin thinking? He is among the elite of the NHL, but his judgment here is a bit skewed. After firing Don Meehan, the head of Newport Sports Management, after five years to pick up..his mother as an agent? Meehan is a very respected agent and to replace him with a parent does not seem like a wise decision on the part of Alexander Ovechkin. Jen Z from thepinkseats.com puts it perfectly:
Uh oh. Parent managers = TROUBLE. Sure, Ovie's mom Tatiana has some sporting experience - she played basketball for the former Soviet Union and won Olympic gold medals in 1976 and 1980. But she's got the poor track record of celebrity parent-managers working against her. A quick look at a few parent-manager nightmares shows this might not be a good idea....The father of young country singer LeAnn Rimes makes a great example of a parent-manager gone wrong. In 2000, LeAnn sued her Dad for filching her out of over $7 million. What if there is a money-hungry woman inside of Mama Ovechkin, who will pull a big fat profit for herself at the expense of Ovie? You never know! I can see those dorsal fins circling as we speak...the lawyer sharks are probably licking their chops right now.
The folks at Hockey Passion share these sentiments,
Personally I don't think this is a good move. Meehan is one of the best agents around and it's never a good idea to mix family and business. Plus for a star like Ovechkin he needs somebody to handle his career of the ice as well as his contracts and while his mom was a star athlete (she won two Olympic gold medals in basketball), she will soon learn that the business side of pro sports is pretty complex.I understand the desire to keep the money in the family (in terms of the commission) but when you consider how much a player like Ovechkin can gain off the ice it is better to get the best representative possible to manage his career.
Good Luck to Ovechkin as he embarkes on a new journey with his mother.
